Anyone Can Whistle
by DebbieB
Summary: It's hard to avoid entanglements aboard a starship. Christine Chapel has a big entanglement passed out on her sofa, and she needs to decide whether she wants to get rid of him or not.


Anyone Can Whistle By DebbieB Series: TOS Characters: Chapel  
  
Anyone can whistle, that's what they say - Easy Anyone can whistle, any old day - Easy It's all so simple Relax, let go, let fly So someone tell me, why can't I?  
  
I can dance a tango; I can read Greek - Easy I can slay a dragon, any old week - Easy  
  
What's hard is simple What's natural comes hard Maybe you could show me How to let go, lower my guard, learn to be free  
  
Maybe if you whistle, whistle for me  
  
Stephen Sondheim, 1964  
  
*****************  
  
I should wake him. It's late, I'm tired, and the last thing I want is a scandal. I should wake him, send him back to his hotel room, and let him sleep it off without any further input from me.  
  
I'm beginning to think that shore leave is not the best thing for me. Maybe I should be like Spock-spend my leave exploring alien libraries, or in my office, or taking advantage of the free lab space on Enterprise to do some extra research.  
  
I watch McCoy as he sleeps, passed out on the sofa of my suite. I am torn, torn between wanting to cradle him, cover him with a blanket and hold him till the pain goes away.and wanting to take a pillow and smother him in his sleep.  
  
I've played so many roles in the three years I've known him. Nurse. Sounding Board. PR Agent, Spin Doctor, Bouncer, and Pep Squad. I've seen him sick, drunk, angry, expansive, confused, crushed, and victorious. I've listened to rants and confessions and brainstorming sessions until I can't think anymore without hearing his voice instead of my own.  
  
Crossing lines is a dangerous thing. I learned with Roger never to cross certain lines. Business must remain business. I spend too many hours at work to be miserable. That monumental, embarrassing, horrendous mistake with Spock aside (along with subsequent unavoidable lapses in judgment), I have managed to keep my personal life as separate from my working life as possible.  
  
It's harder on a starship than planetside. Everybody on this ship is a coworker, in the broadest sense, so I have to make some bonds somewhere. But it's amazing how easy it is to stay apart, to pull away, to slam down that wall between you and just about everyone else on the ship.  
  
I'm the queen bee bitch guardian of Sickbay, and I know it. Nobody gets to McCoy except through me, even when I'm not there. I smile. I joke. I show the appropriate amount of concern. But they know and I know that I'm a force to be reckoned with on my own turf.  
  
It's an amazingly heavy burden, being Leonard McCoy's gatekeeper. He would work himself to shreds, drink himself to oblivion, if I didn't keep him in line. Not to be overly self-aggrandizing. I know another nurse could do my job.  
  
But would another nurse be so purposefully oblivious to his charm? So warmly cold in the face of that desire to mother, to love, to baby him? I've seen it before. It's so easy to let it fall into the realm of codependence, a doctor and nurse, a businessperson and secretary, any person who supports another on a professional level.  
  
I did it with Roger. I mistook professional admiration for love, and love for desire, and desire for something that would take a lesser person to the edges of the galaxy. I became that lesser person, and I'm still struggling back towards fullness.  
  
I won't be his nurse forever. I will return to medical school and finish my MD. I know this without hesitation. I will find a way to make myself into the person I need to be, and I will do it without pulling strings, and without submission or self-degradation.  
  
He is snoring now. Damn it. He looks sweet. I turn it off, shut it down, slam the feeling so hard into the bottom of my stomach that my pelvis rocks with the force. I should never have accepted his invitation to dinner. I should have smiled that professionally ambiguous nurse smile of mine and pushed him off to a later date, knowing full well that "later date" would never arrive.  
  
But something in the air, some stupid song on the entertainment channel, something I ate maybe, had softened me. Sure, I said. I have Friday night free. Let's try that Andorian spot, just outside the opera house.  
  
He was charming. He was funny. The food was sizzling hot, spicy and exotic. We had fun together. It was so nice.  
  
What is wrong with me?  
  
My computer terminal is open to the Enterprise medical computer. I usually check the status of any patients during shore leave, keeping tabs on the staff who pulled the leave rotation opposite me. I know better than to leave it to McCoy, who spends his leaves more drunk than sober.  
  
Like tonight.  
  
He took me dancing. What a stupid thing to do. Salsa dancing, to be specific. I know I move like a ton of bricks, but somehow the music and the drink made it fun. I loosened up.  
  
I ignore the rhythms still pulsing through my brain as I check on Ramirez. Poor kid. Just her luck to get a contagious virus right before shore leave. I need to remember to pick her up a souvenir tomorrow-some cheesy little gift with Starbase 74 on it, just to remind her she wasn't forgotten.  
  
His hands were so warm on my waist. Gods and goddesses, it felt good to move. Not walk, not stand, but move, fluid and unguarded.  
  
I'm not drunk. I haven't been drunk in years. Even if I didn't work for Dr. Johnny Walker, I'd stay away from the stuff.  
  
Leonard turns fitfully on the sofa. Damn. Stop calling him Leonard.  
  
Dr. McCoy should go back to his hotel room. I didn't think to bring detox pills, mainly because I never get drunk, and he's going to need them.  
  
We talked. We talked about life, and religion, and politics. We laughed and gossiped and speculated. We discussed deep space and inner space and personal space.  
  
When he kissed me, I didn't stop him. I slipped into that kiss in spite of myself. I breathed in his alcohol breath, and returned my sober breath, and we fed each other carbon dioxide for several long moments.  
  
He touched my body. His hands were clumsy. Drunkenness will do that to even the most gifted surgeon.  
  
I'm not sure what turned me to ice. Maybe it was the way he whispered my first name. Maybe it was the random thought that I'd remember this in the morning, and there was only a 50/50 shot he'd remember anything. Maybe it was the slant of light reflected from the planet below.  
  
I pulled away. I pushed him away. I was polite. I was professional.  
  
He understood.  
  
We drank some more. We talked and laughed some more.  
  
He fell asleep.  
  
I want him out of my hotel room. I want him out of my skin and my breath and my heart.  
  
But I can't force myself out of this chair. I can't reach out to wake him, to sober him up and send him home.  
  
I want to be alone.  
  
I want to be alone.  
  
There is no way to avoid entanglements, I think. They claw into your life, forcing you to notice. Forcing you to form an opinion, for or against.  
  
I set my jaw. Stand up. Walk across the room.  
  
Warm, nurse hand on his shoulder. Kind, patient nurse voice.  
  
"Wake up, Doctor," I say. Nurse words.  
  
He mumbles, confused, as I rouse him, put his arm over my shoulder and walk him back across the hall to his room. He gropes for balance as I deposit him, fully dressed in his bed. I search his bag, and find a bottle of detox pills. I put it on the nightstand and fill a pitcher of water in the bathroom, setting it and a glass next to the pills.  
  
Good night, Doctor, I murmur.  
  
Back to my room. Back to my work.  
  
Good night, Doctor.  
  
The End 


End file.
